The Beginning

Hi everyone!

To start let me give you a bit of information about myself and why I even started this blog.

The person behind the keyboard

So my name is Kathleen, I am a 4th year Applied Linguistics TESOL student. To clear up a common question I get asked early on I only speak ONE language (English); a degree in linguistics doesn't mean I spend my four years learning individual languages, instead I learn about language in general and how to analyze it. 

Here is how Brock's faculty of Applied Linguistics defines the program:

Brock Applied Linguistics

"Applied Linguistics is concerned with the systematic study of language structure, the acquisition of first and subsequent languages, the role of language in communication, and the status of language as the product of particular cultures and other social groups." (Brock University, Department of Applied Linguistics)

On the side I learn Korean, but that’s just because I plan to live in South Korea for work. I plan to teach English internationally after I graduate, I love to travel and I love language so I thought, hey what a perfect job!

2010 - Dominican Republic D.R.E.A.M.S (Dominican Republic Education and Medical Support)

 A big part of who I am is humanitarian trips and volunteering, I love to go interact with the locals of an area and to be able to learn from them. 

2013 - Me and my students from Taiwan 

2014 - My classmates and Teacher 친구

I put myself in my students’ shoes this summer when I went to South Korea to study the language. This was a great experience but also extremely difficult for me. I did this because the best way to enhance your knowledge in your field is to put yourself in the shoes of your client. You gain insight into what they want and how they feel in different situations. It also makes them feel like they can trust you better and connect with you because you've been there. 

Why am I blogging and what about? 

This blogs primary purpose is for an online course I am taking at Brock University. It will be used to present and organize the information I learn about in regards to learning in digital contexts. It will also be a learning tool itself; I have only made one blog before in my life and that blog was for a class as well. That blog however was very limited it just consisted of me writing an entry and post...that was it. This time around it seems that I will be learning how to EFFECTIVELY blog, how to use the tools features and how to catch peoples’ attention. To be honest I am pretty excited, I really hope I can learn a lot about the process of blogging because I wanted to start a blog for my teaching and travel experience. 

I am excited to take this class because as a prospective teacher I want to give my students’ modern and fun tools to use that can be an aid in their learning journey. With classrooms incorporating more and more digital resources, this course can provide me with a lot of useful information on how to utilize these resources to better provide for my students. I want to be a teacher that is up to date and can use any material that can benefit, instead of being scared off because I don’t know how to use it.

Basically…

I hope that my learning journey of the digital world can also help anyone reading this blog or even the other way around. These next four months of blogging are sure to be enlightening and hopefully for you entertaining.

Wish me luck!

Kat